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Sundance Festival breakthroughs of 2024: Here are 14 new films to look forward to
The festival returned for rousing in-person premieres, panels, and commemorative screenings of past Sundance breakouts including Napoleon Dynamite and Mississippi Masala.
Maya Dehlin/2023 Sundance Institute / Pho
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Maya Dehlin/2023 Sundance Institute / Pho
The Sundance Film Festival celebrated its 40th anniversary this year and the vibes in Park City, Utah were understandably nostalgic – sprinkled throughout the 10-day event were special screenings of past Sundance breakouts, including Mississippi Masala, Napoleon Dynamite, and Pariah.
But first and foremost, the fest was all about premiering a generous slate of new films by both emerging and established filmmakers, and the options were vast. I was in attendance for much of the festival and had the chance to sample just over 20 features in-person and online, stories ranging from intimate family dramas to bold political statements to charming coming-of-age comedies.
The festival concludes Sunday, but the awards were announced on Friday; among the big winners were the debut feature film In the Summers by Alessandra Lacorazza about the volatile relationship between a father and his daughters which won the U.S. Grand Jury Prize and the Ukraine war documentary Porcelain War which won the parallel U.S. Grand Jury documentary prize.
Some films arrived at the festival with distribution deals firmly in place, but at the time of writing, many deals and potential distribution dates are still being worked out. As is the case every year, the buzz around certain films means we all will be seeing those in streaming or theatrical form at some undetermined point in the future.
Here are some of my favorites from this year.
What the …?
A still from Presence by Steven Soderbergh.
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A still from Presence by Steven Soderbergh.
Sundance Institute
There’s usually at least one movie at Sundance every year that makes you go, What the hell did I just watch??? This year, I saw two: Steven Soderbergh’s immersive ghost tale Presence and Aaron Schimberg’s agitating psychological drama A Different Man.
Soderbergh, ever the experimental filmmaker, collaborated with screenwriter David Koepp to craft the story of a haunted house told entirely from the ghost’s point of view after a new family – which has recently been rocked by tragedy – moves in. (Lucy Liu and Chris Sullivan play the parents, newcomers Callina Liang and Eddy Maday are their bickering children.) The less you know of the details going in, the better. But what can be said for sure is that it’s an experience unlike any other, putting the viewer in the discomfiting position of watching this family’s dramas (and traumas) play out unfiltered. The technical feats Soderbergh pulls off with the camera and editing will be studied for years to come, but the narrative themes and storytelling choices demand equal dissection. Following its Sundance premiere, Presence sold to distributor Neon.
Schimberg’s movie is even weirder, and to be honest, I’m still not sure whether I think it’s brilliant or much ado amounting to … not much. But I’m still thinking about it days later, and it renders one of Sebastian Stan’s best performances to date. He plays Edward, an aspiring actor limited by a genetic facial mutation; after he undergoes reconstructive surgery to alter his appearance, he’s confronted with the consequence of this drastic decision in the form of Oswald (Adam Pearson), a jovial, beloved man who has the same medical condition Edward once had. (In real life, Pearson has neurofibromatosis.) It’s brutal, unsettling, and a lot. A Different Man came to the festival with a distribution deal already in place with A24, so expect to be baffled by it soon enough.
Familial pangs
André Holland and Andra Day appear in Exhibiting Forgiveness by Titus Kaphar.
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André Holland and Andra Day appear in Exhibiting Forgiveness by Titus Kaphar.
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Some of the biggest hits to come out of Sundance tend to be emotional family dramas (see Little Miss Sunshine, CODA). One of my favorites this year is Exhibiting Forgiveness, the feature debut of artist Titus Kaphar, starring André Holland as Tarrell, an acclaimed painter who harbors some unresolved childhood trauma. When his father La’Ron (John Earl Jelks) suddenly reappears in his life, Tarrell’s finally forced to deal with years’ worth of accumulated rage and hurt. What starts off feeling like your standard-issue indie melodrama ultimately emerges as something much deeper, more fascinating, and refreshingly unconventional. Holland and Jelks are excellent here, buoyed by strong supporting performances from Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor and Andra Day.
A Real Pain, Jesse Eisenberg’s second feature behind the camera, was also a pleasant surprise; he and Kieran Culkin play estranged cousins who embark on a Holocaust tour in Poland in the wake of the death of their grandmother. It strikes the right balance of darkness, levity, and grief – the awkward dynamics within the tour group are especially notable – and Culkin is pretty perfect playing a live wire type, who’s somehow both a compassionate empath and terribly uncouth. A Real Pain left the fest with a reported $10 million Searchlight deal.
And then there’s Brief History of a Family, the feature debut of Jianjie Lin, which engages in suspenseful, thoughtful ways with the ramifications of China’s one-child policy. In it, a middle-class family of three is thrown for a loop when the son’s new friend slowly becomes an integral part of the household. Secrets, lies, envy, and unrealized yearnings unravel in this moody thriller, which is being distributed by Films Boutique.
Fight the power (or try to, anyway)
A still from Girls State by Jesse Moss and Amanda McBaine.
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A still from Girls State by Jesse Moss and Amanda McBaine.
Sundance Institute/Apple
Stories about individuals contending with oppression were all over the festival this year, and quite a few stuck out for me. Girls State, a sort-of sequel to the 2020 Sundance hit documentary (and Grand Jury Prize-winner) Boys State, follows teen girls in Missouri who are participating in the annual week-long exercise of building their own democratic government. A couple of unique factors make Jesse Moss and Amanda McBaine’s film, which is coming to Apple TV+ in April, notable: For one, its filming just so happened to coincide with the leak of the draft of the Supreme Court’s majority opinion on the right to abortion. It also depicts the first time both Boys and Girls State were hosted on the same campus – which makes the gender disparities between the two organizations impossible for the girls to ignore.
Another doc, Jazmin Renée Jones’ Seeking Mavis Beacon, is part investigation and part character study. Alongside Gen Z video artist Olivia McKayla Ross, Jones attempts to find Renée L’Espérance, the Black model who served as the face of the ’80s computer program Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing. The film asks complex questions about how Blackness is used and distorted through technology, as well as what it means to dance around ethical boundaries while excavating history.
And a couple from the other side of the world: Kneecap, a loosely autobiographical origin story of the Irish hip-hop group Kneecap, bursts with verve, bite, and righteous rage that calls to mind early Spike Lee. (They insist on speaking and rapping in Irish to preserve the dying language, and in defiance of Britain.) The dynamic trio – Mo Chara, Móglaí Bap, and DJ Próvaí – play versions of themselves alongside Michael Fassbender as Bap’s revolutionary dad.
Then there’s Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat, Johan Grimonprez’s audacious and musical documentary deconstructing the confluence of events and political collusion that led to the assassination of Congolese prime minister Patrice Lumumba. This includes how prominent Black jazz artists were deployed by the U.S. as ambassadors to unwittingly distract from the country’s nefarious behind-the-scenes dealings. The filmmaker’s stylistic approach is riveting, wielding the rhythmic language of Louis Armstrong, Nina Simone, Max Roach, and other jazz greats alongside the callous recounting of gleeful mercenaries and world leaders. Grimonprez and his editor Rik Chaubet also pull abundantly from an array of texts, archival footage and interviews, playing liberally with sound and imagery. There’s so much information to take in, but to their credit, it never becomes so overwhelming as to lose focus.
Adolescence is hard
Maisy Stella and Aubrey Plaza appear in My Old Ass by Megan Park.
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Maisy Stella and Aubrey Plaza appear in My Old Ass by Megan Park.
Shane Mahood/Sundance Institute
Another staple of Sundance is the quirky coming-of-age movie, and My Old Ass and Dìdi deliver plenty of humor and heart.
The former is a high-concept comedy about Elliott, a queer Canadian teen (the winsome Maisy Stella) who can’t wait to leave her family’s cranberry farm behind for college. One night, she and her best friends decide to experiment with mushrooms in the woods, and during her psychedelic trip she meets her older self, played by the always wonderful Aubrey Plaza. Filmmaker Megan Park’s second feature is just weird and charming enough to work as an ode to the sweet dumbness of youth and the sage wisdom of age. It was purchased at the festival for a reported $15 million by Amazon MGM for a theatrical release followed by an eventual streaming debut on Amazon Prime.
The latter, directed by Sean Wang, takes us back to 2008 – AOL Instant messenger, the early days of Facebook, the waning days of Myspace – through the eyes of Dìdi, aka Chris (Izaac Wang), a 13-year-old Taiwanese American boy. It’s set during the summer before he transitions to high school, and as one might expect, it’s both cringey and relatable in how it depicts that awkward period where friendships are tested, hormones rage, and all parents do is nag, nag, nag (or so we kids think). It’s familiar territory, but the performances and attention to period-specific detail (especially as it pertains to the teen lingo) make for a great watch.
Music is healing
Luther Vandross appears in Luther: Never Too Much by Dawn Porter.
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Luther Vandross appears in Luther: Never Too Much by Dawn Porter.
Matthew Rolston/Sundance Institute
Finally, two music documentaries tapped into the emotional power of some of our greatest pop icons.
Dawn Porter’s Luther: Never Too Much is a celebration of the legendary singer Luther Vandross, chronicling his early career as a member of the group Listen My Brother to his final commercially successful comeback with Dance with My Father before his death at the age of 54. There’s lots of great archival footage here, including of Vandross working on musical arrangements for David Bowie’s “Fascination.” Many of Vandross’ collaborators, including Dionne Warwick and Richard Marx, sing his praises and – to an extent – discuss his public struggles with his ever-fluctuating weight and speculation around his sexuality. The doc sadly doesn’t go too deep on the latter issue for reasons that are explained through his close friends, only partly satisfyingly; nevertheless, by the end of the film it’s impossible not to be moved, quite possibly to tears.
A still from The Greatest Night in Pop by Bao Nguyen.
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A still from The Greatest Night in Pop by Bao Nguyen.
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Overlapping a little with the era of Vandross is Bao Nguyen’s The Greatest Night in Pop, which drops on Netflix quite soon – Jan. 29. The “greatest night” in question is the herculean undertaking of the star-studded recording of “We Are the World,” in the hours immediately following the 1985 American Music Awards. As far as Netflix docs go, this is one of the more entertaining ones; Lionel Richie is an executive producer and he’s all over it, telling funny stories about writing the song with Michael Jackson as well as the pressure to deflate all the competing egos in the room that evening.
Does it treat this charity single as if it was the second coming of Jesus? Kind of! Are there some noticeably absent talking heads? Yup! (No Stevie, Diana, or Quincy, though we do get lots of Kenny Loggins soundbites.) Do we ever find out what the heck Dan Aykroyd was doing there? Not really! No matter – this is a breezy, thoroughly enjoyable nostalgia trip.
“She’s like a female Willy Wonka,” Sakief Baron, 36, said about Kendra Austin, 32, after she explained that her personal style had a playful and cartoonish spirit.
Dressed in loose, oversize layers in blue and neutral shades, the couple were walking on the Upper East Side of Manhattan when I noticed them on a Saturday in April. There was a symmetry to their ensembles, so it wasn’t too surprising when she noted that he had influenced her fashion sense.
Before they met, she said, she was “less sure” about her wardrobe choices. “I also have lost 100 pounds in the time we’ve been together,” she added, which she said had helped her to recalibrate her relationship with clothes.
His style has been influenced by hip-hop culture, basketball players like Allen Iverson and his mother’s Finnish background. “I just take all these pieces and then it kind of comes together,” he said.
Both described themselves as multidisciplinary artists; he also has a job at a youth center, mentoring children. “I want to make sure that I look like someone they want to aspire to be every time they see me,” he said.
In my L.A. Buy Nothing group, I started noticing how some objects, given for free from neighbor to neighbor, carry emotional weight. An item was more than it appeared. It was a piece of personal history, perhaps one with generational memories.
From one person’s hands to another’s, objects find new life through the free gift economy on Facebook or the Buy Nothing app. Buy Nothing Project, a public benefit corporation, reports having 14 million members across more than 50 countries who give away 2.6 million items a month. There are more than 100 groups in Los Angeles alone.
Buy Nothing reduces waste by keeping items out of landfills. It also builds community. When our lives are increasingly online, Buy Nothing encourages us to get out of our cars and make connections with neighbors, even if the interaction is no more than a wave when picking something up left by a doorstep. Researchers have found that even small social interactions can foster a sense of belonging.
Still, Buy Nothing has its challenges. For years, some have complained that the groups shouldn’t be limited to neighborhoods, but rather have more open borders. Last year, many longtime members complained about the project enforcing its trademark, leading Facebook to shut down unregistered groups even if they were serving people under economic strain. Critics saw the tattling as a shift from mutual aid toward control and branding. For its part, Buy Nothing says its decisions are based on building community, trust and safety.
Despite those disagreements, Buy Nothing offers a platform for special connections. As much as there are jokes about people offering half-eaten cake, many have passed along treasured items. Buy Nothing items may feel too valuable for the trash or too personal for Goodwill. The interaction between giver and receiver becomes just as meaningful as the object itself.
I set out to document these quiet exchanges in my Buy Nothing group, drawn to the question of why people choose to pass their belongings from one neighbor to another.
Tiny builders, big exchange
Lidia Butcher gives a toolbox and worktable her two sons used to Chelsea Ward for her 17-month-old son.
“We’ve had the toolbox and worktable for the last 10 years, it’s been very special. When I told my youngest son we were going to give it away, he was a little sad. He said he was still playing with it, but then I explained that it’s been sitting untouched for a year and that if we gave it to someone else, maybe someone else would be happy about it. So he felt joy about giving it to another child who would want to play with it. I have this little emotional feeling letting it go, but at the same time, it’s a good feeling. Like a new beginning.”
— Lidia Butcher, 35, joined the group several years ago when someone told her a person in the group once asked for a cup of sugar.
“We’re getting a worktable. Benji is now old enough to be interested in playing with tools. I’m going to move my drafting table out of his room. His bedroom is my office. So that will go into storage or the Buy Nothing group and the worktable will go in its place. We live in an apartment, and as he’s growing, his needs change but our space doesn’t. Buy Nothing is really helpful to be able to cycle out of stuff.”
— Chelsea Ward, 38, has found the Buy Nothing group extremely helpful since becoming a mom.
Something borrowed
Abby Rodriguez lends Sophie Janinet a veil for her wedding.
“Sophie had asked for a wedding veil on our Buy Nothing group and I’m lending it to her because I wanted it to have a second life. I hate the idea that precious things just sit there and never get touched. My wedding day was one of the best days of my life. At one point the power went out and now we have this amazing picture with my husband and I and everyone using their phone to light up the dance floor.”
— Abby Rodriguez, 40, discovered Buy Nothing when she moved to her northeast L.A. neighborhood in 2020.
“I moved to Los Angeles from France four years ago. The day I joined Buy Nothing was the first time I felt connected to the community. It played a huge role in my adapting to life here. I’m receiving a veil because I want my wedding to look and feel like my values. I thrifted my dress, I chose a local seamstress to alter the dress but when I tried it on, I felt something was missing. I wanted a veil but I didn’t want to buy new because I didn’t want to add anything to the landfill. So I posted a request for the veil on Buy Nothing.”
— Sophie Janinet, 37, is recreating the low-waste, slower-paced values she once lived by in France through her local Buy Nothing community.
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1. Abby Rodriguez, left, holds her wedding veil that she is lending Sophie Janinet, right, for her upcoming wedding. 2. Michele Sawers, left stands with Beth Penn, right, while giving her a decorative owl.
A pigeon-spooking owl gets a second life
Michele Sawers gives Beth Penn a decorative owl.
“Coming from a place of luck, now I have plenty to give. The owl has been with me for 26 years. I bought the owl soon after I bought this house. The owl was purchased because I had a pigeon problem, they would camp out under my eves and I would have bird poop everywhere. The owl must have worked because they’re gone and they haven’t come back.”
— Michele Sawers, 58, uses Buy Nothing regularly to connect with her community and support her low-consumption values.
“There are things I don’t want to own. So borrowing those things on Buy Nothing is really nice. There is a person who I borrowed their cooler twice and their ladder twice so I feel like they are my neighbor even though they are not [right next door]. We get these birds that poop on the deck and the recommendation online was to get a fake owl. When it was posted on Buy Nothing, I thought, ‘I have to have that owl!’ It’s going to have a good home with me on the deck with some cats, a dog and some kids.”
— Beth Penn, 47, once helped build her local Buy Nothing group and now experiences it from the other side, as a member.
Stuffed toys find a new purpose
Magaly Leyva, left, stands with Tatiana Lonny, right, with the stuffed toys and play balls she is gifting her.
(Dania Maxwell/For The Times)
Magaly Leyva gives stuffed toys and plastic play balls to Tatiana Lonny.
“My mother-in-law gave the dolls and plastic play balls to my daughter, but she has so much. My daughter is not going to play with them with the same intent that another kid would, because she’s really little. I’d rather another kid use these things.”
— Magaly Leyva, 35, joined Buy Nothing nearly four years ago to find clothes for her nephew.
“I’m taking these new items to a township called Langa in South Africa. I know the kids there will be so happy. They have so little there. I’m doing this all by myself, I’m just collecting a GoFundMe for the suitcase fee at the airport.”
— Tatiana Lonny, 51, began using Buy Nothing in hopes of finding resources to support the animals she rescues.
A second helping
Laura Cherkas gives Aurora Sanchez a cast iron pan.
“Buy Nothing gives me the freedom to let go of things because I know that they will stay in the community and the neighborhood. I’m giving a couple of cast iron items that my husband and I got when we were on a cast iron kick, probably during COVID. We determined that we don’t actually use these particular pans and they were just making our drawers heavy. So we decided to let someone else get some use out of them.
“I hate throwing things away. I want to see things have another life. Sometimes I take things to a donation center, but I like the personal connection with Buy Nothing and that you know that there is someone who definitely wants your item.”
— Laura Cherkas, 40, has built connections with other moms through Buy Nothing and values it as a way to cycle toys in and out for her child.
Laura Cherkas, left, holds the pan she is gifting Aurora Sanchez, right, through Buy Nothing.
(Dania Maxwell/For The Times)
“I wanted a cast iron pan because I cook a lot of grilled meat. I’m excited to try this style of cooking out and it will help me when I cook for only one or two people. I got lucky because I was chosen to receive it.”
— Aurora Sanchez, 54, has spent the past two years engaging with Buy Nothing, finding in it a sense of neighborly support that makes her feel valued while strengthening her connection to the community.
Next player up
Joe Zeni, 70, is using his local Buy Nothing group on Facebook to give away a basketball hoop he used with his son when he was little.
(Dania Maxwell/For The Times)
Joe Zeni first offered a basketball hoop on Buy Nothing in 2023, where it remains unclaimed.
“I’m giving away a Huffy basketball freestanding hoop because it’s just taking up space. We used to play horse and shoot baskets together. My son is now 35, he doesn’t live here anymore.”
— Joe Zeni, 70, uses Buy Nothing often to give items away, believing many of the things he no longer needs still have purpose.
In the year since his death, there has been no hard pivot at Armani. The shadow of the founder has stayed in place over the Milan HQ, where the brand seems happy to leave it. Armani is not just plumbing the past for continued inspiration, it’s reselling it.
Today, Giorgio Armani is announcing Archivio, a grouping of 13 men’s and women’s looks, plucked from the brand’s back catalog and remade for today. (And, yes, at today’s prices.) There’s a jacket in pinstriped alpaca of 1979 vintage; a buttery one-and-a-half breasted jacket with a maitre d’s flair that first appeared in 1987; and an unstructured silk-linen suit that will activate ’90s flashbacks for die-hard Armani clients and those who want to capture that era’s nostalgia. The advertising campaign was shot and styled by Eli Russell Linnetz, who has his own label, ERL, but always seems to be the first call brands make when they want sultry photos with the aura of Details magazine circa 1995. (He did a similar thing for Guess recently.)
Linnetz’s images are a reminder of how Armani’s work still reverberates decades later.
Archivio is also a canny recognition of what shoppers crave now. On the resale market, Armani wares are as coveted as can be. Every week it seems as if I get an email from Ndwc0, a British vintage store, announcing a new drop of meaty-shouldered ’90s Armani power suits. They sell for less than $500. At Sorbara’s in Brooklyn, you can buy a tan Giorgio Armani vest for $225.
That vintage-mad audience is in Armani’s sights: To introduce the collection, it’s staging an installation, opening today, at Giorgio Armani’s Milan boutique. It will feature the hosts of “Throwing Fits,” a New York-based podcast whose hosts wear vintage Armani button-ups and shout out stores like Sorbara’s.
It’s prudent, if a bit disconnected. Part of the charm of old Armani is that it can be found on the cheap. I’m wearing a pair of vintage Giorgio Armani corduroys as I write this. I bought them for $76 on eBay. Archivio is reverent, but its prices, which range from $1,025 to $12,000, may scare off shoppers willing to do the searching themselves.
If you ask me, the next frontier of this archive fixation is that a brand — and a big one — will release a mountain of genuine vintage pieces. J. Crew and Banana Republic have tried this at a small scale, but a luxury house like Armani hasn’t gone there. Yet. Eventually, Armani (or a brand like it) is going to grab hold of the market that exists around its brand, but through which it gets no cut.
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